


and death shall have dominion

by extra_plus_ordinary



Series: After Balance [5]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast), the adventure zone
Genre: Angst alert, Angus McDonald dies, Post Balance Arc, Tags to be added, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, reaper!Angus McDonald
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-11
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-13 09:02:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12980679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/extra_plus_ordinary/pseuds/extra_plus_ordinary
Summary: This isn't what dying's supposed to be like.(Or: The boy detective becomes a boy reaper.)





	1. Act 1

**Author's Note:**

> Instead of worrying about my future/researching uni programs, I decided to kill a little boy and doesn't that just show where I'm at in life.  
> YES I AM EDITING

i. Fin

We see Barry and Lup, back to back, and they’re just _fuckin’ the Hunger up._ And the camera pans upward and we see scenes of just- _everyone_ , fighting this fight. We see Hurley and Sloane’s battle wagon driving around, just like- brake-sliding into Hunger that explodes into ash as they crash through them, and we see Klaarg and his family, like, run up a, a, a massive shadow and just start, like, picking it apart as they’re hanging off of it, and we see scenes of the world winning the fight.

{ 89:17 }

And then we see Angus.

He's laying on the ground, face up in what seems to be a dark spot of water on the ground. The camera focuses and we notice that the dark spot isn't water, it can't be water because it's blood, crimson rivulets of blood that spurt out of the boy detective’s stomach with every beat of his dying heart. His face is contorted, marred by the spasms of pure pain that shake his body and jar his very soul, slipping ever so slowly out of it's container. His senses are blurred and waning, yes, but he can still make out flashes of light emitted by spells zooming across his line of sight, can still hear the sounds of combat raging all around him and comes to the cold realization that no one was coming to save him. His chest heaves and expands and contracts, expands and contracts, expands and contracts.

And he can't expand again, he can't breathe as his organs shut down one by one, ending with his heart that fades out in his ears, his body going numb (thank goodness, thank goodness, he thinks) and his hearing slowly leaving him, as if his life was a speaker and someone had turned the volume off.

His last thought is that he had forgotten to close his eyes.

His first thought is that the world looked eerily beautiful in black and white.

Death is on standby, and it's because of this that Angus wakes up on the ethereal plane.

He wakes up next to his body, which both disconcerts and fascinates him. He stands and looks down at himself-not a scratch on him. His stomach is whole, unlike the bloody mess that was hanging out of his flesh on the ground beside him. He looks down at himself at finds that he can't do this and still stay sane and so he begins to move around.

It isn't long before he finds another body.  
  
And now, through Angus's eyes, we see a woman, hovering nervously over the monochrome, writhing body of a man on the Prime Material plane. He's being held down, screaming and bucking against the medics that try to start up healing spells. He drifts closer and notices the wound on his leg, spurting with bright red arterial blood. The man is also mouthing a name.

“Alice?” Angus says, and the woman looks over at him. She's wearing armour, the light steel of a battle caster.

“How did you-” She pauses and looks back at the man. “Oh. He's enunciating my name quite nicely, isn't he.” She smiles and tries to lay her hand on his forehead, only to slip through his form and she frowns. The student in him comes out before he can catch himself and he tells her that _we're not real, ma’am, we can't interact with the living on the Prime Material plane_ . She seems to understand and acknowledge this, muttering that enchantment is her shit anyway before moving away from the man and towards something on the left, away from his line of sight. Angus follows and finds her body, now- all dust and embers and burning skin and he can't help but make a sick noise from the back of his throat and she laughs. “Not the best way to go, I'm sure.” She looks back at the man, who has stopped struggling but is now crying, tears rushing down his face as he repeats the same word over and over again. “The idiot tried to fight a dragon.” Angus raises a brow at this and she just lets out a sigh that says _do you see what I have to deal with_. “It was a small dragon, mind you, but it still took a bite out of him before trying to roast him for dinner.And,” She splays her hands out at her body. “You know the rest of the story.”

“You saved his life.”

“It wasn't the first time.” She sits down beside the man and he joins her, a useless bid in trying to comfort someone a universe yet an inch away. “We traveled together for a while, you know, and it was always him just rushing into things without thinking for a damn second.” She pauses, memory crossing over with story. “Just like that Magnus fellow in the Story.”

Magnus. The name draws up big grins, tight hugs and duck carvings he didn't want but still cherished. Magnus, the Protector. His name gives rise to several other names that give rise to several other memories that swirl around in his head and _oh._

_I'm dead._

He lets out a quiet sob, one hand over his mouth and the other clutching a chest that didn't hurt.

_I'm dead. I'm dead and I'm never going to see them again am I-_

The woman takes note of his distress and reaches out hesitantly before enveloping him in a loose embrace. Her form is solid but she’s not-warm and not-cold but it's something and he leans into it gratefully, heaving and gasping as the enormity of it all overtakes him. The woman hushes and cooes at him for a while before something in her breaks and she's sobbing as well, clutching onto his small form as they weep for what they have lost.

They cry and cry until something catches Angus's eye through the tears and he looks up to see light.

And… we see one of the shadows attacking Neverwinter stop in its tracks, and we see its form start to glow with a bright, white light. And then this shadow, along with all the others still standing, they all turn into light and drift slowly up and into the sky. And the rest of the army reacts too as the Hunger is spirited away, and the—the massive tendrils above, they glow white also as they begin to peel backwards, away from the sky, splitting apart at the top into long branches that—that arc downward, turning them into the shape of these great, light-filled, weeping willow trees. And then they explode in a shower of brilliant, slowly cascading balls of light. And they’re all bewildered by this scene, light reflected in Angus’s not-really-glasses and in the faces of everyone who put their lives on the line to defend this world and those who lost them in the process.

{ aprox. 1:50:00}

The world stops for a second. The man with the wounded leg looks up in shock before beginning to cry all over again, but at least this time there’s a smile on his face and the woman can’t help but stroke his hair lovingly. Her hand passes through his head but she keeps stroking anyway, humming a song he doesn't know but somehow reaches the man because he slumps into an exhausted stupor and she looks up and past him with wide eyes and so he looks.

Death was on standby, but with the defeat of the Hunger the Astral plane has once again been opened for business. One, two, dozens of souls now begin to drift toward the rift, and it's not long before he feels the pull as well, calling his soul to the sea where it came. The warrior looks at the rift, at her love, and then at him before patting his curls and silently slipping away, floating toward her final resting place.

He's about to leave as well before he hears his name.

_“Angus!”_

Standing ten feet away from him is an elf with an impressive hat and a shocked look on his face. He's all white as well, and for a second he thinks that he's dead as well before noticing the slight green of his tunic, the tinge of gold in his hair and understands that the Taako in front of him was very much alive and had just cast Blink.

Taako says his name again and he’s suddenly engulfed in a hug before he starts to get berated.

“How the hell are you dead, kid?” A flick to his nose. It connects but it doesn’t hurt, hands moving by muscle memory alone to cup it as he mutters “Sorry, sir. Didn't move fast enough I guess.”

“Out of all the saving throws, you just had to miss this one, didn't you?” The sentence makes no sense to him, but the elf just huffs and puts his hands on his hips. “You're lucky you're compadres with like, the best wizard ever because fret not, bubbeleh, Taako’s busting you outta this plane.”

“How?”

Two people ask this question.

One is Angus, who's eyes visibly widen when he sees the other appear from a rift behind Taako, scythe twirling and popping out of existence as the wizard turns and just says “Oh, hey Krav. How's work?”

“It's the end of the end of the world. What do you think?” He runs a hand through his dark hair but still manages to crack a warm smile. “I'm happy you're alright, Taako.”

Angus swears a bit of pink appears on the elf’s cheeks, but he just says “Who isn't, m’dude?”. The reaper, to his credit, just smiles even bigger and reaches up to adjust Taako’s hat. “So what were you saying about bringing a soul back?”

Even from behind the boy can see his teacher’s shoulders tense up in anticipation for a fight. “We're not reallly bringing someone back from the dead, babe,” He puts his hands on the reaper’s shoulders and moves closer. “The kid isn't in the Astral plane yet, so he's technically-”

“Still my responsibility?” Kravitz still has a pleasant tone to his voice but there's an edge to it now. “He’s dead, love. He can’t be brought back .”

“We can and we will,” The fingers on Kravitz's shoulders start to dig into his suit. “We've been messing with magic for a century, bubbleh, don't underestimate us.”

“Wouldn't dream of it.” Kravitz takes Taako’s hands into his own and brings them to his chest. “But death isn't bound by magic.”

There's a heavy truth to that statement and he can see it a few feet away; his cold body, just entering rigor mortis, surrounded by the people he secretly thought of as family: Merle, burning spell slot after spell slot to try and repair the mangled mess that was his torso. Magnus, clutching onto the dwarf by his shoulders as if he could transfer energy by touch even though the whole thing is useless, just useless and he sees this realization in Lucretia, Lucretia who's just covering her mouth in horror (he knows she blames herself, he would give anything to tell her she wasn't).

His focus shifts back to the couple when he hears Taako’s voice crack.

“ _Please_ ,” He's saying, the tone torn between begging and negotiating. “This one time. We saved the freakin world, we deserve this _one time_.”

“I'm sorry.” Kravitz's voice is low and quiet. “I'm sorry, I don't make the rules.”

“ _Please_.” Hands are fists that knock back against a chest and it occurs to the boy that this was never going to work and that, frankly, he wasn't sure if he wanted it to work.

“Uh, sir? I'm sort of dead.” Taako turns and gives him a look that says _shut up Anges or I'll break your stupid nerd glasses_ but he forges on. “I mean, living would be great and all, but if there's no way to go back...I've made my peace.”

That was a lie, but Taako doesn't know this and his face crumples into devastation for a quick second before smoothing out into a pitying indifference.

“Magnus is going to kill me if I don't get you back.”

He looks back at the fighter, tears running down his face as he cradles Angus’s body. He looks small in Magnus’s arms, so very small and

“I know.”

“And you're never going to eat my world-class macarons, you hear me? You can haunt my ass all you'd like.”

“I know-”

“And-and-ah,” The wizard sighs and tips his hat downward, just enough to cover his face. “You know what? Screw it. I tried.”

“Taako-” Kravitz reaches for him again but before they touch Taako cancels the spell, popping out of and into existence in a heartbeat. He reappears beside Merle and he looks up at the elf expectantly before closing his eyeThe reaper sighs and summons his scythe again. He extends a hand and Angus takes it, watching in awe as Kravitz uses his other to tear open a rift in space. He looks down at the boy, an indescribable look on his face.

“I'm sorry this had to happen.”

Angus shrugs. “Not your fault.”

They step into the rift.

Angus McDonald died on the Day of Story and Song about two hours before sunset.

ii. Interlude

It’s familiar.

But not _too_ familiar.

The rainbow hued waters that gently lap the obsidian sand do not perturb the boy detective as he steps out of the rift with Kravitz. Here, the Astral plane is dead silent, only half formed with a horizon that separates the not-sea from the not-sky that was a type of grey that reminded Angus of the steel of weapons.The water, while brilliant and enchanting, seems to be festering with something underneath the surface In the distance there is an island, the huge fortress that he instinctively knows as the Eternal Stockade, solitary and intimidating and somehow familiar at the same time. In the distance, there is another island, a smaller one with actual trees and grass in their normal viridian hue. This is the island that confuses him, and he asks Kravitz about it as they begin their trek away from the coastal line.

The man looks at the island, and then at him for a time before answering “That's...a reward.” He ends the conversation by picking up his pace, practically running up the slope that separates the land from the beach. Angus follows suit, scrambling to keep up with Kravtiz’s long strides. He crests the hill and suddenly in front of him is empty, empty, empty except that there is a _gazebo_ made of ebony and bones _,_ smackdab in the middle of the nothingness that made up most of the Astral Plane.

Kravitz sits down on one of the chairs and gestures for the boy to join him. He hesitates but obliges, sitting in front of him awkwardly.

_This isn't what dying's supposed to be like._

Kravitz chuckles. “Not your idea of death?”

The boy's taken aback but his mind is already processing his words, reviewing Kravitz's demeanor, his posture, his speech pattern before it finally clicks.

“You're not Kravitz, are you.”

The reaper smiles, the sharp edge of his incisors flashing as skin parts to show teeth. When he speaks the baritone tenor is gone, replaced with a voice that seems to reverberate through the plane itself.

_Took you a while to figure it out, detective._

Angus smiles sheepishly. “The whole dying thing has put a hamper on my sleuthing abilities, ma’am.”

Kravitz-the Raven Queen, rather-smiles again and nods their head in understanding.

_Your death was not conventional, child._

They turn and look towards the pulsating waters, waves crashing onto the beach even though the rest of the ocean stands still.

_Death is a constant with many forms. While all departed souls are in my realm, I do rely on my reapers to track down those who dare to escape inevitability._

The Queen extends a hand to the ocean waves and it’s like he's watching them on rewind, gathering themselves and falling back into the water. She turns back to the child.

_Some escape their notice. Not many, but some._

Kravitz’s head is slightly cocked to one side.

_Do you understand where I'm going with this, little one?_

“You want me to become a reaper?”

A nod.

“Why?”

_You are a child of many talents. It would be a shame to let go of a soul of your caliber so soon._

Something clicks into place in his brain.

“That's why Merle couldn't heal me.”

The Queen spreads Kravitz's hands, a gesture that is perhaps the closest to apology one could receive from a goddess.

_To pull you from my domain would be a loss on my part._

“I see.” He supposes he could argue this, claim that it wasn't fair that he was brought in front of Death so soon so that a goddess would avoid "suffering a loss", but there's a part of him that shushes that notion, telling him that it was high-time he'd died anyway and that angering the Queen would be more trouble than it was worth. His fingers, once neatly folded on his lap are now separated, one on his chin and the other on his knee. “What do I get out of this?” He asks Death. “What’s in it for me?”

_Time._

The word hangs in the air and in his mind. His mouth moves faster than his thoughts and he finds himself saying yes, yes, I accept and Kravitz starts to reach for him.

Flesh peels back to reveal bloodless bone and eyes roll back and disappear, a red fire igniting in the holes of his skull. Hands of bone caress his chin and rest on his cheeks, biting into his not-skin. Energy crackles through the specter, lifting his dark robes ever so slightly as the Raven Queen’s powers races across his body and floods into Angus.

And there is pain-part of him feels as if it's being ripped apart, gravitating towards the Queen and another part feels as if he's melting, skin he doesn't have ripping away to reveal bones he doesn't have. There is a moment, a split second between ripping and melting that he wonders if he can die a second time.

And then there is nothing.

And then he wakes up.


	2. Act II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Angus wakes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can literally tell when I started speeding shit up I'm so sorry

iii. Revival

When a battle has been fought, there are always bodies.

The Day of Story and Song may have ended with a triumphant victory but in the night that proceeds there are those who suddenly breathe another's name. They look around, frantic to find their lover, their brother, their comrade. Before dawn there are those you can see on the battlefield, clutching another in their arms as they wail, as they cry softly into their chest, as they kiss them goodbye.

Most bodies are burnt; a custom for those fallen in battle.

Angus’s body is not.

When he wakes up he's in a dark room, lit only by the night sky that was only just beginning to lighten. The roof was partially gone, he noted, most likely due to an attack by the Hunger. His hands immediately go to his chest and stomach, searching for his wound. It's there but at the same time it's not; his sweater vest and shirt are burnt and stained with blood yet his torso is whole, save for the scar tissue that now wraps around most of his middle.

There is also the issue that his heart does not beat.

Angus takes a breath, trying for calm composure as he stands and takes a look around. His glasses hang from what's left of his shirt but his vision is clearer than it ever was before death, the dark room being cast with an eerie red glow that illuminates everything in his line of sight. (Darkvision? Must be.).

It takes him a moment to realize that he's in a morgue.

A makeshift one, staffed by none and kept cool by various Rays of Frost cast around the room. He doesn't feel the cold and it occurs to him that it's because he's the same temperature as the room itself, his corpse already having gone through algor mortis. The bodies that lay around him are few, about two dozen Bureau members that died in the midst of the confusion and battle. He sees Johann, most of his body covered in a white sheet and a broken violin on his chest. The bard has a smile frozen on his face, and the boy wonders what his last thoughts were before spotting a rift open up to his right.

Once again, the reaper steps out, his ghoulish form quickly forming skin and expression as he lays eyes on Angus. “Glad to see you're up and moving so quickly,” He says with a sympathetic smile. It's all Angus could do to smile back. “Thank you, sir. I feel fine.”

A lie, of course, but Kravitz just nods a bit absentmindedly as he takes in his surroundings. “My Queen...well, Our Queen is letting us off the hook for a while as the Astral Plane straightens out. What you do is up to you, but-”

“Angus?”

He's interrupted by a gasp. They both turn to the exit and see Lucretia standing by the only doorway into the room. Her hands are wrapped in bandages and she's leaning on her staff, body heavy with exhaustion. Her eyes, however, are shiny and wide as she takes in the two standing in a small sea of corpses and she launches herself at him, wrapping her arms around his little body. He freezes for a moment, her body heat like a hot brand on his skin but he hugs back. “Nice to see you too, ma'am,” he says and she pulls back, taking in his scarred stomach and cold hands. Her face shifts into an expression he can't decipher and she shoots a look at Kravitz, who has enough grace to look uncomfortable.

The exhaustion takes hold again, and she ends the reunion with a “Let's get you cleaned up,” before ushering them out of the makeshift morgue. The moon base is quiet and eerily so, the only regular sounds coming from the hangar as cannons fire and receive cannonballs.

They walk across the quad and towards the dorms. The building has, oddly enough, survived the apocalypse relatively unscathed, and it's apparently one of the only buildings that still has plumbing. She takes them in from the back door and leads them to an empty dorm floor and somehow produces a simple set of clothes out of nowhere, handing them to Angus. “They're resting on the ground floor,” she says before ruffling his curls again. “Come find us when you're done.”. She glances at Kravitz, who hesitates but follows her as she turns and walks back down the hall.

And now, Angus is alone.

-

The oddest thing about his body is the absence of blood.

He discovers this as he’s drying himself off. He spent most of the shower in relative discomfort, the hot water feeling as if it was burning through his dead flesh before ebbing away as he reached a human body temperature. (He wondered how Kravitz put up with it, the pain that came with holding Taako.)

He turns off the shower and exits, grabbing a towel and trying not to stare at his exposed stomach. He has new scars as well; a pale streak along his calf, a dark splash on his forearm, a slit on his neck. He finds them oddly easier to look at, these injuries. He's inspecting a scar on his right ankle, bending over to take a closer look before he feels his left leg give out from under him, slipping on the wet tiles.

And then he's face down on the floor. He feels fine; the coldness of the tiles are just a small discomfort, and he stands up with ease, wiping himself dry from the excess moisture that had clung to the tiles during his shower. He folds the towel neatly, placing it on a rung. He slips into the t-shirt (“Fantasy Costco!” It reads in giant red and blue font. He wonders if Garfield got out alright.) and sweatpants the Director had provided for him, pausing to check out his reflection. The mirror is fogged and blurry, only reflecting the shape of a boy in a white graphic tee. There's something on his forehead, a dark shape that looks like a wayward curl. He runs a hand through his hair, smoothing his hair down like his grandfather always told him to. He's bringing down his hands when he sees it, splayed across the soft inside of his palm.

It's nothing.

A void has opened across his hand.

It's in the shape of a scrape, the type one may endure if they, perhaps, had slipped and fallen onto a tiled floor. The skin around the wound is fine, but the wound itself is just black nothingness on his hand, a void where skin meets flesh and bone.

He closes his hand.

The cabinet under the sink contains a simple first-aid kit, and from it he gets a roll of gauze. Once, twice he wraps it around his palm, tying it up neatly and placing it back where it belongs before exiting the bathroom. Again, a temperature shift; he shivers against the cool air as he feels his body giving up the heat it so recently obtained. He's barefoot, both shoes and socks dirty and bloodied beyond repair and so he feels the coolness of the ground beneath his feet (It's the ground that should be above him, he thinks suddenly. He should be dead.) He takes the stairs one at a time, hesitating at each landing as he nears the ground floor. He knows that this would not change: his hair would still be ruffled, hugs would still be bone-crushing, snide remarks would still sting in that good way that remarks from a loved one sometimes do. This would not change, and he was happy about this, grateful for their near-idiotic nonchalance and acceptance of the odd and weird and downright messed up.

He reaches the ground floor. It's a lounge area, the common room for all the dormitory residents. It's relatively large, big enough to hold a modest party of 50 drunk people. It only holds ten now; Kravitz, Lucretia, and Davenport all look up from the large dining table as he enters the room. They look tired, unbearably so; Lucretia looks like she's about to faint from exhaustion anytime now, and the gnome has eyebags darker than the Hunger itself. Only Kravitz seems to have any sort of energy left, and he uses it to smile wanly at the new reaper, gesturing for him to sit down.

The rest are all asleep; Carey and Killan, all wrapped up in each other, only take up one plush armchair in the corner of the room. Magnus has monopolized a whole couch for himself, snoring lightly with Steven balanced on his chest. Merle is on the ground beside him, one soulwood hand still clutching the Xtreme Teen Bible and the other in Magnus's grip.

Taako is wrapped in a robe.

That's what it looks like at first, but as the robes shift a little he notices their form, wisps with mass and volume that curl around the wizards prone body. The top of the robe, where the head was to be, shifts and turns to look straight at him as if it felt his eyes on it.

Lich, his soul whispers, and for some reason the thought is disgusting to him. It's disgusting, they're _disgusting,_ and it's all he can do to clench his fists and look away from the red robe that is now floating in front of him silently.

“Hey, kid,” a feminine voice comes out of the robe. “Still sorry about your macarons.”

“It's okay, ma'am!” The pleasant tone is forced and harsh in his ears, but if the lich had made a note of it, he didn't know. “I made some more after the incident. They tasted much better after I added in the sugar!”

“Did you now?” If the smoke that was her soul could smile then it would be, a weak pulse of magic flowing from her nonexistent body into his own. It feels like happiness and relief, and Angus feels himself relax just a fraction in front of her, this abomination that had saved his world.

There's shuffling behind her.

“Lup?”

Taako’s eyes open a fraction. The red robe turns quickly and spreads its essence around him, a mimicry of hands placed upon his chest and shoulders.

“Yeah, bro?”

The words are nonchalant, casual, and yet the elf still bolts upright and clutches at her robes, squeezing them once, twice before taking in the rest of the room. His gaze drifts over Angus for a split second before snapping back and staring at him with a look of confusion on his face. “Angus?”  He swings his legs over the couch and peers at him, at his pale skin and simple clothing. “Didn't you die? Or was last night just a mindfuck like the last ten years of my life?”

(The Director flinches at that last comment and stares down at her folded hands that lay neatly on the table. Neither her captain or the reaper offer any consolation, but neither do they acknowledge Taako's remark. It's the closest thing to a passive stance they can take on this matter. She is grateful for it.)

“Um,” Angus looks down and shuffles his bare feet. “I did die. A little.For like, a few hours.”

“I got that, boychik. So how are you back?” The boy looks at him and then at Kravitz hesitantly, not sure what to tell him. It only takes his mentor a few seconds to put two and two together and he looks at Kravitz, who for once looks straight at someone in the room instead of shifting his gaze to the side.  He blinks, once, twice before ... this?”

Angus looks at the floor, and then straight at Taako as he lies.

“Yes.”

He sees him visibly relax before getting up from the couch and stretching. “Well then, cha’boy’s rested long enough and I need a fuckin’ bath, so if you’ll excuse me-”

“Taako, wait-”

Kravitz stands and tries to move toward him, but is caught up in a flurry of red motion and magic. “Not so fast, Skeletor.” Lup says, her red hood mere centimeters from Death’s face. “Don’t we have business to take care of?” He hesitates, glancing towards the door Taako scurried out of and back to the lich in front of him before sighing. “Let's take this...outside.”

They both disappear into thin air, and Angus finds himself much too tired to be worried about them. He crawls onto the now vacant couch and curls up into himself, emptying his mind and filling his ears with the idle yet tense conversation between the Wordless One and The Lonely Journal Keeper that devolves into a one-sided yelling match that still devolves into a grown woman sobbing quietly onto a rosewood table and the sound of small feet quickly walking out of the room. He knows he should comfort her and he does, getting up and putting his small arms around her neck and letting her hold him like a mother would a child, trying not to focus on her warmth or the fact that he isn't a child anymore, he's just a soul trapped in a body and _there's a hole in his hand._

He falls asleep in her arms, his dreams filled with the sea and ravens.

 

He wakes up and he’s alone.

There’s darkness all around him and there's something entangling his body. For a second he thinks he's back on the battlefield, fighting with a wand that breaks in his hand (Spellotape is cheap as shit) before he's rammed with a pillar of pure evil, his eyes seeing nothing but shades of black and red as the Hunger gouges out his stomach and sucks out his HP before moving on to another target, leaving him to die on the ground, oh God he's dying, he's dying and there's blood everywhere and the pain won't _stop, the blood it won't stop please I need help anyone can anyone save me please save me take the pain away please kill me help me please I need, I need I need I need_

A light.

It comes out of the corner of his eyes and it blinds him for a moment. He squints and he can see movement, quick and panicked, a large shadow racing towards him and he screams, arms splayed out in a pitiful attempt to stop his attacker. Arms wrap around his torso and he screams again, legs flailing and catching the unknown assailant in the lower stomach but they're unfazed, holding him tighter to his body and saying something, shouting it into his ear in order to be heard over Angus’s screams that _it's Magnus, it's Magnus calm down Angus you're safe now it's safe, you're safe_ and it takes several minutes for him to understand what's being said to him, another five to actually manage his breathing until he stops screaming, stops hyperventilating and just stops breathing in general, all the while in Magnus's embrace. The man still doesn't let go of Angus after his panic subsides, rubbing his back and humming a melody that has undertones of static and loss. As he relaxes further into his embrace, Angus begins to deduce:

  1. He is in a bedroom. It's a single dorm room, which means he's on the Moon. He must have been carried as he slept.
  2. The heaviness entangling his body was the thick furry blanket that was placed on top of him while he slept. He used to adore blankets like these, so perfect for winter nights and late reading under the covers. He's not sure what to make of them now.
  3. The light was from a doorway which leads into a brightly lit hall. The light is presently being blocked by two figures; one tall with hair falling delicately around their shoulders and entwining around their elfin ears, the other short and stubby with an arm that didn't look like a regular arm. When he sees them they vanish.
  4. He had been screaming, when Magnus had come.



 

“Sir?” Angus asks tentatively, his voice raspy from screaming. His throat, miraculously, doesn't hurt, any ripped vocal chords probably just fading out of existence like the skin on his hand that he still had bandaged. Magnus doesn't respond, just holds him tighter to the point where, if he had been a breathing boy, said breath would have been knocked out of him.

“Sir? Magnus?” Magnus tenses when he says his name and pulls away, squinting in the dim light to see Angus's face. He looks older, now, the weight of a century’s worth of memories on his shoulders. He looks sad, so very sad and tired and it occurs to Angus that he might have woken him up from sleep. He's uncomfortable with this fact. He's never screamed in his nightmares before.

“I-I'm fine now, sir. Sorry for the noise. Please, go back to sleep.”

“You were dead.”

Magnus’s voice is soft and cracked at the edges. A recent memory bubbles up; him watching his own body being cradled and cried upon by a hero from another reality.

“Yeah.”

“You were dead in my arms. I held you as we went back to the moon.”

He’s not sure how to respond to this, instead sinking deeper into the fighter’s embrace. He’s warm, comfortably so, and he can hear the steady _thump-thump-thump_ of his still-beating heart against his head and it’s nice, so very nice but he knows he shouldn’t inconvenience Magnus for too long, knows how annoying having a child cling to you must be.

“I’m fine, now sir, you can go back to sleep. Sorry for screaming.”

Magnus sighs and it feels like a sob wracking through his body, holding Angus to his chest as he falls back onto the bed. “Guess I’ll sleep here, then,” He says and Angus stutters, struggling a bit in his embrace. “R-really? Y-You don’t have to d-do that for _me_ , sir, I-”

“Shut up, Django,” Magnus holds him closer, cradling the undead child in his arms. Angus, to his credit, shuts up and closes his eyes, relaxing slightly with each heartbeat that wasn’t his. The last thing he hears before he falls is Magnus’s voice, uncharacteristically quiet.

_I’m sorry._

 

-

_Beautiful tapestry._

_Thank you._

_But this strand…_

A hand brushes a thread. It runs short yet vibrant, a brilliant cobalt twisting and turning through various threads and lives before-

_It’s turned._

_So it has._

It’s the colour of ravens, of darkness. Death.

_Poor child._

_It is as Fate ordains it._

_It is as Death desires it._

The thread is erratic, sweeping through swathes of fabric to wrap around certain threads, only to cut them off. It disappears from parts of the tapestry all together, reappearing at different places. The thread twists around itself, convoluted and strained as it frays and unwinds until it’s small enough to miss, running weakly along a straight path. The tapestry has not been finished.

_How tragic._

_How beautiful._

_Fate can be changed._

_Yet Death cannot._

Fate and Death have met are meeting will meet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know when I'll post the next chapter since it's high school exam season, but I'll probably get one up

**Author's Note:**

> Y'all, your feedback is literally gonna tell me whether or not to continue so give your girl a holla at  
> http://extra-plus-ordinary.tumblr.com/


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